OpenRaiser/Intern-Atlas huggingface dataset:
MDACE: MIMIC Documents Annotated with Code Evidence
Venue: arXiv cs.CL 2023
Year: 2023

We introduce a dataset for evidence/rationale extraction on an extreme multi-label classification task over long medical documents. One such task is Computer-Assisted Coding (CAC) which has improved significantly in recent years, thanks to advances in machine learning technologies. Yet simply predicting a set of final codes for a patient encounter is insufficient as CAC systems are required to provide supporting textual evidence to justify the billing codes. A model able to produce accurate and reliable supporting evidence for each code would be a tremendous benefit. However, a human annotated code evidence corpus is extremely difficult to create because it requires specialized knowledge. In this paper, we introduce MDACE, the first publicly available code evidence dataset, which is built on a subset of the MIMIC-III clinical records. The dataset -- annotated by professional medical coders -- consists of 302 Inpatient charts with 3,934 evidence spans and 52 Profee charts with 5,563 evidence spans. We implemented several evidence extraction methods based on the EffectiveCAN model (Liu et al., 2021) to establish baseline performance on this dataset. MDACE can be used to evaluate code evidence extraction methods for CAC systems, as well as the accuracy and interpretability of deep learning models for multi-label classification. We believe that the release of MDACE will greatly improve the understanding and application of deep learning technologies for medical coding and document classification.
Memory-Immersed Collaborative Digitization for Area-Efficient Compute-in-Memory Deep Learning
Venue: arXiv cs.AR 2023
Year: 2023

This work discusses memory-immersed collaborative digitization among compute-in-memory (CiM) arrays to minimize the area overheads of a conventional analog-to-digital converter (ADC) for deep learning inference. Thereby, using the proposed scheme, significantly more CiM arrays can be accommodated within limited footprint designs to improve parallelism and minimize external memory accesses. Under the digitization scheme, CiM arrays exploit their parasitic bit lines to form a within-memory capacitive digital-to-analog converter (DAC) that facilitates area-efficient successive approximation (SA) digitization. CiM arrays collaborate where a proximal array digitizes the analog-domain product-sums when an array computes the scalar product of input and weights. We discuss various networking configurations among CiM arrays where Flash, SA, and their hybrid digitization steps can be efficiently implemented using the proposed memory-immersed scheme. The results are demonstrated using a 65 nm CMOS test chip. Compared to a 40 nm-node 5-bit SAR ADC, our 65 nm design requires $\sim$25$\times$ less area and $\sim$1.4$\times$ less energy by leveraging in-memory computing structures. Compared to a 40 nm-node 5-bit Flash ADC, our design requires $\sim$51$\times$ less area and $\sim$13$\times$ less energy.
MARBLER: An Open Platform for Standardized Evaluation of Multi-Robot Reinforcement Learning Algorithms
Venue: arXiv cs.RO 2023
Year: 2023

Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning (MARL) has enjoyed significant recent progress thanks, in part, to the integration of deep learning techniques for modeling interactions in complex environments. This is naturally starting to benefit multi-robot systems (MRS) in the form of multi-robot RL (MRRL). However, existing infrastructure to train and evaluate policies predominantly focus on the challenges of coordinating virtual agents, and ignore characteristics important to robotic systems. Few platforms support realistic robot dynamics, and fewer still can evaluate Sim2Real performance of learned behavior. To address these issues, we contribute MARBLER: Multi-Agent RL Benchmark and Learning Environment for the Robotarium. MARBLER offers a robust and comprehensive evaluation platform for MRRL by marrying Georgia Tech's Robotarium (which enables rapid deployment on physical MRS) and OpenAI's Gym interface (which facilitates standardized use of modern learning algorithms). MARBLER offers a highly controllable environment with realistic dynamics, including barrier certificate-based obstacle avoidance. It allows anyone across the world to train and deploy MRRL algorithms on a physical testbed with reproducibility. Further, we introduce five novel scenarios inspired by common challenges in MRS and provide support for new custom scenarios. Finally, we use MARBLER to evaluate popular MARL algorithms and provide insights into their suitability for MRRL. In summary, MARBLER can be a valuable tool to the MRS research community by facilitating comprehensive and standardized evaluation of learning algorithms on realistic simulations and physical hardware. Links to our open-source framework and videos of real-world experiments can be found at https://shubhlohiya.github.io/MARBLER/.
Training Physics-Informed Neural Networks via Multi-Task Optimization for Traffic Density Prediction
Venue: arXiv cs.NE 2023
Year: 2023

Physics-informed neural networks (PINNs) are a newly emerging research frontier in machine learning, which incorporate certain physical laws that govern a given data set, e.g., those described by partial differential equations (PDEs), into the training of the neural network (NN) based on such a data set. In PINNs, the NN acts as the solution approximator for the PDE while the PDE acts as the prior knowledge to guide the NN training, leading to the desired generalization performance of the NN when facing the limited availability of training data. However, training PINNs is a non-trivial task largely due to the complexity of the loss composed of both NN and physical law parts. In this work, we propose a new PINN training framework based on the multi-task optimization (MTO) paradigm. Under this framework, multiple auxiliary tasks are created and solved together with the given (main) task, where the useful knowledge from solving one task is transferred in an adaptive mode to assist in solving some other tasks, aiming to uplift the performance of solving the main task. We implement the proposed framework and apply it to train the PINN for addressing the traffic density prediction problem. Experimental results demonstrate that our proposed training framework leads to significant performance improvement in comparison to the traditional way of training the PINN.
Edge-Aware Mirror Network for Camouflaged Object Detection
Venue: arXiv cs.CV 2023
Year: 2023

Existing edge-aware camouflaged object detection (COD) methods normally output the edge prediction in the early stage. However, edges are important and fundamental factors in the following segmentation task. Due to the high visual similarity between camouflaged targets and the surroundings, edge prior predicted in early stage usually introduces erroneous foreground-background and contaminates features for segmentation. To tackle this problem, we propose a novel Edge-aware Mirror Network (EAMNet), which models edge detection and camouflaged object segmentation as a cross refinement process. More specifically, EAMNet has a two-branch architecture, where a segmentation-induced edge aggregation module and an edge-induced integrity aggregation module are designed to cross-guide the segmentation branch and edge detection branch. A guided-residual channel attention module which leverages the residual connection and gated convolution finally better extracts structural details from low-level features. Quantitative and qualitative experiment results show that EAMNet outperforms existing cutting-edge baselines on three widely used COD datasets. Codes are available at https://github.com/sdy1999/EAMNet.
Understanding the power-law nature of participation in community sports organizations
Venue: arXiv cs.SI 2023
Year: 2023

The improvement of living standards and awareness of chronic diseases have increased the importance of community sports organizations in promoting the physical activity levels of the public. However, limited understanding of human behavior in this context often leads to suboptimal resource utilization. In this study, we analyzed the participation behavior of 2,956 members with a time span of 6 years in a community sports organization. Our study reveals that, at the population level, the participation frequency in activities adheres to a power-law distribution. To understand the underlying mechanisms driving crowd participation, we introduce a novel behavioral model called HFBI (Habit-Formation and Behavioral Inertia), demonstrating a robust fit to the observed power-law distribution. The habit formation mechanism indicates that individuals who are more engaged are more likely to maintain participation, while the behavioral inertia mechanism suggests that individuals' willingness to participate in activities diminishes with their absences from activities. At the individual level, our analysis reveals a burst-quiet participation pattern, with bursts often commencing with incentive activities. We also find a power-law distribution in the intervals between individual participations. Our research offers valuable insights into the complex dynamics of human participation in community sports activity and provides a theoretical foundation to inform intervention design. Furthermore, the flexibility of our model enables its application to other data exhibiting power-law properties, broadening its potential impact beyond the realm of community sports.
Multi-Level Power Series Solution for Large Surface and Volume Electric Field Integral Equation
Venue: arXiv cs.CE 2023
Year: 2023

In this paper, we propose a new multilevel power series solution method for solving a large surface and volume electric field integral equation based H-Matrix. The proposed solution method converges in a fixed number of iterations and is solved at each level of the H-Matrix computation.The solution method avoids the computation of a full matrix, as it can be solved independently at each level, starting from the leaf level. Solution at each level can be used as the final solution, thus saving the matrix computation time for full H-Matrix. The paper shows that the leaf level matrix computation and solution with power series gives an accurate results as full H-Matrix iterative solver method. The method results in considerable time and memory savings compared to the H-Matrix iterative solver. Further, the proposed method retains the O(NlogN) solution complexity
Chain-Free String Constraints (Technical Report)
Venue: arXiv cs.FL 2023
Year: 2023

We address the satisfiability problem for string constraints that combine relational constraints represented by transducers, word equations, and string length constraints. This problem is undecidable in general. Therefore, we propose a new decidable fragment of string constraints, called weakly chaining string constraints, for which we show that the satisfiability problem is decidable. This fragment pushes the borders of decidability of string constraints by generalising the existing straight-line as well as the acyclic fragment of the string logic. We have developed a prototype implementation of our new decision procedure, and integrated it into in an existing framework that uses CEGAR with under-approximation of string constraints based on flattening. Our experimental results show the competitiveness and accuracy of the new framework.
Attacking (EC)DSA scheme with ephemeral keys sharing specific bits
Venue: arXiv cs.CR 2023
Year: 2023

In this paper, we present a deterministic attack on (EC)DSA signature scheme, providing that several signatures are known such that the corresponding ephemeral keys share a certain amount of bits without knowing their value. By eliminating the shared blocks of bits between the ephemeral keys, we get a lattice of dimension equal to the number of signatures having a vector containing the private key. We compute an upper bound for the distance of this vector from a target vector, and next, using Kannan's enumeration algorithm, we determine it and hence the secret key. The attack can be made highly efficient by appropriately selecting the number of shared bits and the number of signatures.
PCG-based Static Underground Garage Scenario Generation
Venue: arXiv cs.AI 2023
Year: 2023

Autonomous driving technology has five levels, from L0 to L5. Currently, only the L2 level (partial automation) can be achieved, and there is a long way to go before reaching the final level of L5 (full automation). The key to crossing these levels lies in training the autonomous driving model. However, relying solely on real-world road data to train the model is far from enough and consumes a great deal of resources. Although there are already examples of training autonomous driving models through simulators that simulate real-world scenarios, these scenarios require complete manual construction. Directly converting 3D scenes from road network formats will lack a large amount of detail and cannot be used as training sets. Underground parking garage static scenario simulation is regarded as a procedural content generation (PCG) problem. This paper will use the Sarsa algorithm to solve procedural content generation on underground garage structures.
ReviewRanker: A Semi-Supervised Learning Based Approach for Code Review Quality Estimation
Venue: arXiv cs.SE 2023
Year: 2023

Code review is considered a key process in the software industry for minimizing bugs and improving code quality. Inspection of review process effectiveness and continuous improvement can boost development productivity. Such inspection is a time-consuming and human-bias-prone task. We propose a semi-supervised learning based system ReviewRanker which is aimed at assigning each code review a confidence score which is expected to resonate with the quality of the review. Our proposed method is trained based on simple and and well defined labels provided by developers. The labeling task requires little to no effort from the developers and has an indirect relation to the end goal (assignment of review confidence score). ReviewRanker is expected to improve industry-wide code review quality inspection through reducing human bias and effort required for such task. The system has the potential of minimizing the back-and-forth cycle existing in the development and review process. Usable code and dataset for this research can be found at: https://github.com/saifarnab/code_review
Lightweight Improved Residual Network for Efficient Inverse Tone Mapping
Venue: arXiv cs.CV 2023
Year: 2023

The display devices like HDR10 televisions are increasingly prevalent in our daily life for visualizing high dynamic range (HDR) images. But the majority of media images on the internet remain in 8-bit standard dynamic range (SDR) format. Therefore, converting SDR images to HDR ones by inverse tone mapping (ITM) is crucial to unlock the full potential of abundant media images. However, existing ITM methods are usually developed with complex network architectures requiring huge computational costs. In this paper, we propose a lightweight Improved Residual Network (IRNet) by enhancing the power of popular residual block for efficient ITM. Specifically, we propose a new Improved Residual Block (IRB) to extract and fuse multi-layer features for fine-grained HDR image reconstruction. Experiments on three benchmark datasets demonstrate that our IRNet achieves state-of-the-art performance on both the ITM and joint SR-ITM tasks. The code, models and data will be publicly available at https://github.com/ThisisVikki/ITM-baseline.
Emotion-Guided Music Accompaniment Generation Based on Variational Autoencoder
Venue: arXiv cs.SD 2023
Year: 2023

Music accompaniment generation is a crucial aspect in the composition process. Deep neural networks have made significant strides in this field, but it remains a challenge for AI to effectively incorporate human emotions to create beautiful accompaniments. Existing models struggle to effectively characterize human emotions within neural network models while composing music. To address this issue, we propose the use of an easy-to-represent emotion flow model, the Valence/Arousal Curve, which allows for the compatibility of emotional information within the model through data transformation and enhances interpretability of emotional factors by utilizing a Variational Autoencoder as the model structure. Further, we used relative self-attention to maintain the structure of the music at music phrase level and to generate a richer accompaniment when combined with the rules of music theory.
Employing Drones in Agriculture: An Exploration of Various Drone Types and Key Advantages
Venue: arXiv cs.RO 2023
Year: 2023

This article explores the use of drones in agriculture and discusses the various types of drones employed for different agricultural applications. Drones, also known as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), offer numerous advantages in farming practices. They provide real-time and high-resolution data collection, enabling farmers to make informed irrigation, fertilization, and pest management decisions. Drones assist in precision spraying and application of agricultural inputs, minimizing chemical wastage and optimizing resource utilization. They offer accessibility to inaccessible areas, reduce manual labor, and provide cost savings and increased operational efficiency. Drones also play a crucial role in mapping and surveying agricultural fields, aiding crop planning and resource allocation. However, challenges such as regulations and limited flight time need to be addressed. The advantages of using drones in agriculture include precision agriculture, cost and time savings, improved data collection and analysis, enhanced crop management, accessibility and flexibility, environmental sustainability, and increased safety for farmers. Overall, drones have the potential to revolutionize farming practices, leading to increased efficiency, productivity, and sustainability in agriculture.
Meta-Policy Learning over Plan Ensembles for Robust Articulated Object Manipulation
Venue: arXiv cs.RO 2023
Year: 2023

Recent work has shown that complex manipulation skills, such as pushing or pouring, can be learned through state-of-the-art learning based techniques, such as Reinforcement Learning (RL). However, these methods often have high sample-complexity, are susceptible to domain changes, and produce unsafe motions that a robot should not perform. On the other hand, purely geometric model-based planning can produce complex behaviors that satisfy all the geometric constraints of the robot but might not be dynamically feasible for a given environment. In this work, we leverage a geometric model-based planner to build a mixture of path-policies on which a task-specific meta-policy can be learned to complete the task. In our results, we demonstrate that a successful meta-policy can be learned to push a door, while requiring little data and being robust to model uncertainty of the environment. We tested our method on a 7-DOF Franka-Emika Robot pushing a cabinet door in simulation.
How is Fatherhood Framed Online in Singapore?
Venue: arXiv cs.CL 2023
Year: 2023

The proliferation of discussion about fatherhood in Singapore attests to its significance, indicating the need for an exploration of how fatherhood is framed, aiding policy-making around fatherhood in Singapore. Sound and holistic policy around fatherhood in Singapore may reduce stigma and apprehension around being a parent, critical to improving the nations flagging birth rate. We analyzed 15,705 articles and 56,221 posts to study how fatherhood is framed in Singapore across a range of online platforms (news outlets, parenting forums, Twitter). We used NLP techniques to understand these differences. While fatherhood was framed in a range of ways on the Singaporean online environment, it did not seem that fathers were framed as central to the Singaporean family unit. A strength of our work is how the different techniques we have applied validate each other.
Bidirectional Attention as a Mixture of Continuous Word Experts
Venue: arXiv cs.CL 2023
Year: 2023

Bidirectional attention $\unicode{x2013}$ composed of self-attention with positional encodings and the masked language model (MLM) objective $\unicode{x2013}$ has emerged as a key component of modern large language models (LLMs). Despite its empirical success, few studies have examined its statistical underpinnings: What statistical model is bidirectional attention implicitly fitting? What sets it apart from its non-attention predecessors? We explore these questions in this paper. The key observation is that fitting a single-layer single-head bidirectional attention, upon reparameterization, is equivalent to fitting a continuous bag of words (CBOW) model with mixture-of-experts (MoE) weights. Further, bidirectional attention with multiple heads and multiple layers is equivalent to stacked MoEs and a mixture of MoEs, respectively. This statistical viewpoint reveals the distinct use of MoE in bidirectional attention, which aligns with its practical effectiveness in handling heterogeneous data. It also suggests an immediate extension to categorical tabular data, if we view each word location in a sentence as a tabular feature. Across empirical studies, we find that this extension outperforms existing tabular extensions of transformers in out-of-distribution (OOD) generalization. Finally, this statistical perspective of bidirectional attention enables us to theoretically characterize when linear word analogies are present in its word embeddings. These analyses show that bidirectional attention can require much stronger assumptions to exhibit linear word analogies than its non-attention predecessors.
GNP Attack: Transferable Adversarial Examples via Gradient Norm Penalty
Venue: arXiv cs.LG 2023
Year: 2023

Adversarial examples (AE) with good transferability enable practical black-box attacks on diverse target models, where insider knowledge about the target models is not required. Previous methods often generate AE with no or very limited transferability; that is, they easily overfit to the particular architecture and feature representation of the source, white-box model and the generated AE barely work for target, black-box models. In this paper, we propose a novel approach to enhance AE transferability using Gradient Norm Penalty (GNP). It drives the loss function optimization procedure to converge to a flat region of local optima in the loss landscape. By attacking 11 state-of-the-art (SOTA) deep learning models and 6 advanced defense methods, we empirically show that GNP is very effective in generating AE with high transferability. We also demonstrate that it is very flexible in that it can be easily integrated with other gradient based methods for stronger transfer-based attacks.
Enhancing Low-Light Images Using Infrared-Encoded Images
Venue: arXiv cs.CV 2023
Year: 2023

Low-light image enhancement task is essential yet challenging as it is ill-posed intrinsically. Previous arts mainly focus on the low-light images captured in the visible spectrum using pixel-wise loss, which limits the capacity of recovering the brightness, contrast, and texture details due to the small number of income photons. In this work, we propose a novel approach to increase the visibility of images captured under low-light environments by removing the in-camera infrared (IR) cut-off filter, which allows for the capture of more photons and results in improved signal-to-noise ratio due to the inclusion of information from the IR spectrum. To verify the proposed strategy, we collect a paired dataset of low-light images captured without the IR cut-off filter, with corresponding long-exposure reference images with an external filter. The experimental results on the proposed dataset demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method, showing better performance quantitatively and qualitatively. The dataset and code are publicly available at https://wyf0912.github.io/ELIEI/